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Wouldn't deliberately designing a machine like that to fail catastrophically be beyond unethical into actually criminal?

What would be unethical or criminal about it? When the tool is built to spec it works perfectly and trouble free for years. Now granted "Flaw" may have been to strong of a word, but how is it our fault if someone tries to reverse engineer a product and doesn`t realize that bronze from Russia reacts very very different then bronze from Korea? Or that gasket must be of a certain fiber in a certain chain or the lubrication will eat right through it. In fact wont alot of products fail if not made exactly?

Is it unethical if company A designs and sells a medication, lets say with a unique bond form then company B tries to copy it, gets one of the bonding agents wrong and kills someone, how is that the other guys fault?

Could the product be designed to work if different materials are used, maybe. but thats not our problem.

The point I was trying to get across is that if trademarks, copyrights, ext... are made weaker, more and more things will be designed..... creatively. So that coping it would prove to be incredible difficult.

Okay that post you just made, that's pretty much completely different than the post above

Designing something in a way that makes it difficult to reverse engineer is not the same as designing a flaw and charging the customers more when they come back to have you fix it

I apologize for not being clear the first time, the part is designed to be very very difficult to reproduce with out the manufacturing process. But when the customer comes back because the company in china fucks it up, they will be charged through the ass, and then we explain how much cheaper it will be in the future if they just stay with us.

captmorgan on May 2008

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Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular

I understand what you're saying, but (that's how it seems to me) you're doing it from a position of ignorance. I also heard that "Patents are good."(tm).
The report makes a very good case about why almost all the attributed to IP direct benefits are not in any way a cause of the legislation and has several industry studies showing how the effects persist without the presense of IP laws.
I haven't been able to find significant flaws in their logic & examples, but I'm not saying there aren't any. Won't mind being presented with one. I'm way more inclined to believe statements backed by examples than plain statements.
Oh yeah, also, "there has never been a good argument" is kinda....kinda lame.

EDIT: Ok, instead here is my argument for why IP is good -

IP rewards innovation and the innovator. Patents also serve the additional function of guaranteeing that the operation of a particular invention has to be public domain information. Without the concept of protection of intellectual property, no innovator has any incentive to innovate because in a modern world any large company with a pre-established manufacturing base will simply be able to copy the idea and out-produce the original inventor. Generic drugs take off because copying a known chemical compound is very easy with organic chemistry knowledge, whereas the process of screening and identifying a new compound and gaining FDA approval or similar is incredibly expensive and difficult. Patents however do mean that once the compound is out of it's protected period, the exact process for synthesizing it is generally public domain (this is why I know how to make modafinel for example).

It goes further then this though - without IP, the very process of innovation is damaged because there is no secure way in which you can possibly collaborate with others to develop your original idea. Even if we retained the concept of a "trade secret" (like the Coca-Cola formula), it is far too easy to secretively leak the details of an innovation at which point the above problem again arises - it is unlikely that any small innovator (and there are a lot of them, even in high tech fields) can compete versus a multinational.

The lack of protection would go further however - if we accept that no matter how large a corporation could not develop the invention before the original inventor, it still does not resolve the problem that the moment an invented product is presented to the market, it can be immediately copied unless paranoid or unreasonable measures are made to prevent it.

The real problems with IP law relate purely to implementation and relatively new concepts. It should never have been technically possible to patent genome sequences for example. Software patents last way too long. In the latter case, my argument would be that the patent system needs a new functionality wherein the office can select patent issue durations based on expected times for marketability. Drug and medical patents probably need something separate altogether to make them equality supporting - I would propose a system of fixing percentage charges based on income for them i.e. a cancer drug's cost will be means tested against it's users with the ideal net effect being that Americans pay rates necessary to offset R&D while the 3rd world is not denied life saving treatments.

electricitylikesme on May 2008

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Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular

The facts, as they stand are that artificial scarcity is detrimental to the consumer, and consumers these days are more aware of that fact and have a far greater number of tools for circumventing this scarcity. There are infinite goods and scarce goods and the marginal costs of infinite goods is zero. Recordings, blue prints, software are all infinite goods. Concert tickets, product development, personal time and professional and technical support services are scarce goods. The advance of technology is unstoppable and consumers are getting ever more savvy and cannot be prevented from exploiting properies of infinite goods. So, things have to change because consumers are not going accept their devices being crippled, and are not going to pay for an inferior experience or an equal one they can otherwise get at a lesser cost (be it in terms of financial cost or effort and convenience) and while business models are predicated upon the assumption that things are otherwise will crumble and then those who do intellectual labour find they're unable to make a living.

Seriously, this argument shows why consumerism really needs to just die. "Let's ignore the fact that actually making the original product cost time and money, and just focus on that it's easy to make copies!" This is the mentality that's gotten us into the mess we're in with regards to resource depletion - the shallow "it's all about me" attitude that lets people ignore that, amazingly, there's more to the matter than "I want." Please, explain to me why someone who creates something you want shouldn't be recompensed for their work because they work in intangibles that doesn't make you look like a greedy pig?

So, what is the solution? Find mechanisms to exploit the properties of infinite goods to make scarce goods more desireable or valuable (i.e. free music ala NIN increases the fan base and makes the Collector's Editions valuable commodities upon which money can be made). Use infinite goods platform for other scarce properties (i.e. Google - a powerful free search engine attracts many users which allows them to utilise the scarce good of customer attention and advertising space to make money). Take advantage of the fact that we overestimate the value of free goods, so including them in other limited transactions makes them seem additionally attractive beyond their strict value to consumers. And so on, and so forth.

Or, let's shitcan the consumerist model (which, let's face it, hasn't really worked all that fucking well for us so far) and go back to the model where the needs of both the producer and purchaser are balanced against one another. Something tells me that my plan ends up being the healthier one in the long run.

Stop being an asshole. Stop being hysterical. Stop acting stupid. Basically, stop acting like a stupid, hysterical asshole your posting history shows that this is not your limits and you're far more capable of discourse with those holding competing views than this.

First of all, it's utterly disingenuous to characterise my, or anyone else who's posted in this thread's position as "those who create IP do not deserve to be compensated for their efforts", and it's equally disingenuous to pretend that opposing the current copyright and patent system, or even IP laws in general is the same thing as oppsing just recompense.

Second of all, don't even act like your assault on "consumerism" and the consumer mentality is a rebuttal or even a relevant response to the economic forces at work, or the unstoppable advance of technology and its implications for any sort of information dissemination.

Thirdly, unless you have a model which involves money coming from the land of gumdrops and rainbows then you need to rely upon what consumers are willing to pay and what they're willing to pay for. Supply and demand is the principle at work, and it's what we have to deal with, regardless of whether it's a reality we like or not, it's the way things are.

Fourth, don't confuse what IS with what OUGHT to be. Consumers will aquire IP for free regardless of it occurs within the bounds of a system that ensures IP producers are justly compensated. Which is not to say that it is a moral good or that it should be their legal right, only that it's the reality we have to deal with.

And so given that I think people should be paid for their efforts and I recognise that the current system is not sustainable (and also, as an aside ill-concieved - rife for abuse and ultimately detrimental to innovation and content creation). Business models need to take into account the realities of infinite goods and scarce goods - and things of ways to utilise the infinite goods to make the scarce goods more useful, attractive or otherwise valuable. Development time, song writing, people's attention are all FINITE, scarce goods and there are ways to capitalise upon the value of the infinite goods they produce to recieve payment for their time, effort and expertise without relying upon copyright and patents. These models have the advantage of being sustainable as they don't rely upon infinite goods or artifical scarcity to make money and instead take that into account.

The other thing to consider is - are you paid for the manual labour your grandfather did 70 years ago? What about the work you did 10 years ago? Why should someone continue to be paid for the intellectual work for they did 6 months, let alone 6 years ago?

Nice crab thinking you got there.

My girlfriend left me because she said I was too shellfish. I lobster. But I blame myself, I shrimped my responsibilities. I spent too much time looking at prawn. However the whole experience brought me closer to my crawdad.

Wouldn't deliberately designing a machine like that to fail catastrophically be beyond unethical into actually criminal?

What would be unethical or criminal about it? When the tool is built to spec it works perfectly and trouble free for years. Now granted "Flaw" may have been to strong of a word, but how is it our fault if someone tries to reverse engineer a product and doesn`t realize that bronze from Russia reacts very very different then bronze from Korea? Or that gasket must be of a certain fiber in a certain chain or the lubrication will eat right through it. In fact wont alot of products fail if not made exactly?

Is it unethical if company A designs and sells a medication, lets say with a unique bond form then company B tries to copy it, gets one of the bonding agents wrong and kills someone, how is that the other guys fault?

Could the product be designed to work if different materials are used, maybe. but thats not our problem.

The point I was trying to get across is that if trademarks, copyrights, ext... are made weaker, more and more things will be designed..... creatively. So that coping it would prove to be incredible difficult.

That's actually a pretty incredible idea, if we put a slight spin on it.

Normally the way that Chinese companies get a pattern to copy and reproduce is either through a company that wants them to make it and keep quiet where they got the design, OR from the US patent office. If we decided to put some slight flaws in the patent, it might throw them for a bit. The really beautiful part is that maybe one in ten companies that specialize in economy manufacturing over there have anyone with even a tiny idea of what's really going on. I'm not sure that they could even fix a backwards transistor.

Problem is, for marine and auto parts, you have to meet all kinds of government regulations. And your submissions for most of them will be accompanied by a patent number. The submission for regulations HAS to work, or it can't be sold here. The patent check is only a few seconds away for someone who'd want to bust us.

So I guess I changed my mind, it's not all that great. "Evil begets evil" is a dangerous game to play.

Now this, I think, is a most interesting case and not manifest abuse of copyright (if a stupid use of it).

For those who want to get the gist without reading the details, Prince, out of nowhere and being unconcerned with internet usage and swapping and so forth, started being very concerned. And issuing takedown and infringment notices all over the shopping centre.

Culminating of a fan-posted video from a recent concert where he covered Creep by Radiohead.

Prince's label demanded that youtube take down all videos of the song. But Thom Yorke, of Radiohead, who recognises that this is of significant benefit to him (and Prince as well) has demanded that youtube put them all back, as he holds the copyright on the song Creep.

Wow! Now given that the practical discussion has gone down in lames (sic) why don't we has a bit lesss controversial topic to discuss the morality of it all, in general? Under the law, who owns the rights to the Prince cover? Can Radiohead demand they put it back? What SHOULD the law state to be in keeping with "what's right"?

Apothe0sis on June 2008

Tide goes in. Tide goes out.
Es-annon NEVA 4GET

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firewaterwordSatchitanandaPais Vasco to San FranciscoRegistered Userregular

A significant amount of my firm's business stems from giant companies suing other giant companies over patent infringement.

On a personal level, I think a lot of it is somewhat absurd. Especially when you factor in "patent trolls." But still, for all the baseless suits, I still think it's a necessary aspect of business.

Bingo. My GC set up a whole "lets get some patents" gang that was all about putting some quivers in the bow related to patent defense. We had no interest in defending our IP rights. We just wanted some ammo when we got hit by some fucker with a broad claim so we had some cross license ammo.

You can't patent ideas. Not even according to today's screwed up law. Software patents really have no ground to stand on. Code is redundant almost all the time in almost all the applications. The made up difference between patenting a mathematical algorithm and "patenting a useful result achieved with a mathematical algorithm" is probably the biggest farce in "intellectual property" history.

I'm sorry, but that has to be one of the largest crocks of shit I hear regularly from the anti-IP crowd. Yes, a program is, at its very core, a mathematical algorithm. But guess what - someone had to put time, labor, and money into developing that algorithm, and I feel that stripping them of the right to have a limited period of exclusivity to benefit from their work is the behavior of a selfish, entitled prick.

99.9% of software just reuses common algorithms and practices. There is a large set of problems for which the algorithms are interchangeable without much options for improvement. Competitive advantage through 'speshul use of algorithums' is really really rare. Most software patents are just used to blackmail other companies who happen to use similar popular algorithms or as a bargaining tool.

Patents are there to make certain kinds of business reward models possible. With real world products, research often takes a huge amount of money, so awarding a period of exclusivity to recoup that is sensible. Writing software gets nowhere near that kind of cost. I think the damage done through patent trolls will always outweigh what you could ever gain with a software patent system.

It's true that there is a danger of diminished innovation on both sides of the argument. 'No software patents' is clearly the less dangerous end. It's also the less restrictive end, the less expensive end and the less bureaucratic end. If you know a way to fix the software patent system so it's less prone to abuse or show that the economic gain of software patents outweighs the loss through lawsuits, checking for prior art/patents and the having to keep a whole bureaucracy running to support it, feel free to share.

peterdevore on June 2008

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Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular

So, in response to Apothe0sis, , I think that you (like most tech-minded people who look at this matter) continue to try to view what is a social issue through a technological lens because it's more familiar. But when it comes down to it, the matter is not one of a technological or economic scope (though both do come into play), but rather a social phenomenon.

First off, I want to say that I find your argument to be, frankly, childish. When you boil it down to its essential aspect, it is nothing more than "might makes right" (or to be more accurate, "ability makes right".) It is the argument that because one can do something, that one is justified in doing something. To say that this is an unhealthy and simplistic view is an understatement. It looks at the issue in a short term, self-centered manner that handwaves long-term repercussions away or pushes them onto other groups.

In response to your first argument, I will point out that while you're not outright saying that creators should be recompensated, you're basically saying that they should have little say in how they are. You argue that you will only find a limited number of models acceptable, regardless of if they can effectively supply recompense and encourage further development. In addition, as I pointed out earlier, a large part of my problem with many "anti-IP arguments" is that they're really not anti-IP arguments at all, and as such are rather disingenuous in of themselves. Finally, I find the words of those speaking out to be the most damning part of this - how many times have you heard a musician who has spoken against piracy to be written off by those opposed to his views with the statement "if he was a real musician, he'd do it for the love of the music and not care about money." I've heard that refrain over and over, and it makes me question the real motives of the movement. So no, considering your side's track record and rhetoric, I don't see questioning that your side being opposed to recompense of creative producers being all that disingenuous.

As for your second point, again, this is a social phenomenon, not an economic or technological one, and to try to characterize it as such is just a ploy to avoid an honest discussion of what's happening. This is a push to unilaterally rewrite the relationship between producer and consumer by the latter, regardless of the repercussions of doing so. As such, applying a social critique of the underlying components of said phenomenon is exactly what's needed. My point is that consumerism, and more specifically the shallow, self-oriented consumerism that focuses on the desires of the consumer at the expense of everyone else in the chain, is a very unhealthy way to go, and I see that as being a major driving force here.

That leads me into your final two points. This is a social phenomenon, with the goal of expressly redefining how the producer-consumer relationship is structured, with a heavy push to permanently tilt it heavily in favor of the consumer. There is a heavy push to legitimize the attitude that the producer should be grateful for whatever he or she is given. Let's try a thought experiment - let's say that somehow, the RIAA and the labels just vanish. No more suits, the relationship is just the artist and the fans. Do you think that if that happened, the people who have been so vehemently arguing against the RIAA are going to pack up shop? Or do you think they're just going to find new justifications for their attitudes? Considering some of the rhetoric I've heard (and which I pointed out earlier), I'll put my money on the latter. And it is the legitimization of the act, not the act in of itself, that is the problem. No industry (well, no smart industry, anyways) expects perfectly compensated consumption of their product. (That's in part why the term "shrink" was invented.) But when you see people outright stating that they have a legitimate right to the work of some artist without paying for it - there's a serious problem with that. And in the end, such an attitude is going to choke off creative work as the artists will find it unfeasible to sustain themselves on the limited models available to them.

In addition, there's been a strong thread of delegitimzation of the work of those who don't work with technology, and even those who don't hew the party line. One need only look through this thread to see the attitude that people who don't work in the "right" industries aren't respected at all. So that has helped as well, as it makes it easier to say "oh, he's just a musician/actor/etc." and just discount any points made. Finally, as I pointed out, your final comment is just crab thinking - the only reason you feel that way is because you think that somehow the guy who makes such a work is somehow getting a better deal than you, and that's just not fair! It shows a paucity of the soul to me when people take that attitude, because it says to me that instead of seeking to be happy for others good fortune, you want them to be held to your level.

In short, this is a social movement, and as such has to be looked at as one. Ability alone is not a justification for conduct, and such arguments need to be laughed at. And finally, we need to create a balanced agreement which treats all sides fairly - which, at least in my view, those opposing IP tend to be unconcerned with at all in fovor of promoting their interests over everyone elses.

In addition, there's been a strong thread of delegitimzation of the work of those who don't work with technology, and even those who don't hew the party line. One need only look through this thread to see the attitude that people who don't work in the "right" industries aren't respected at all. So that has helped as well, as it makes it easier to say "oh, he's just a musician/actor/etc." and just discount any points made. Finally, as I pointed out, your final comment is just crab thinking - the only reason you feel that way is because you think that somehow the guy who makes such a work is somehow getting a better deal than you, and that's just not fair! It shows a paucity of the soul to me when people take that attitude, because it says to me that instead of seeking to be happy for others good fortune, you want them to be held to your level.

This really makes me wonder if you read that thread - most people's opinions boiled down to a) He was already VERY well compensated for his work, and b) Honestly, actors aren't really THAT big of an influence on a game as a whole.

Also, what is crab thinking? You've used that twice now and I'm still not sure what that means. Do you mean like, the crab in a bucket syndrome? Where they pull each other down?

In addition, there's been a strong thread of delegitimzation of the work of those who don't work with technology, and even those who don't hew the party line. One need only look through this thread to see the attitude that people who don't work in the "right" industries aren't respected at all. So that has helped as well, as it makes it easier to say "oh, he's just a musician/actor/etc." and just discount any points made. Finally, as I pointed out, your final comment is just crab thinking - the only reason you feel that way is because you think that somehow the guy who makes such a work is somehow getting a better deal than you, and that's just not fair! It shows a paucity of the soul to me when people take that attitude, because it says to me that instead of seeking to be happy for others good fortune, you want them to be held to your level.

This really makes me wonder if you read that thread - most people's opinions boiled down to a) He was already VERY well compensated for his work, and b) Honestly, actors aren't really THAT big of an influence on a game as a whole.

Read through the thread. There were several posters that mocked acting as being a simple profession.

I am for IP laws. I can see they flaws and abuses in the current system, but I don't think we would be better off without them.

The system needs to promote innovation and disclosure, those are the biggest benefits of the patent system to society. I think part of the problem is that the patent office is unable to adapt to the changing industry and the courts changing the intrepretation of the patent statute.

Contrary to what some have stated, a patent is an idea. Protection is given to a concept, not a specific object. I know this because my first real job out of college was as a patent examiner. I burned out in two and a half years. I didn't work on software patents, but I didn't have a major problem with the concept of them, now buisness method patents...well that I am not so sure of.

I wonder if there is some way to automate the prior art checking process of patents. Surely there should be some innovation (lol) which would mean a system could identify things similar enough to count.

electricitylikesme on June 2008

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Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular

Well AngelHedgie, it's an interesting task, trying to conduct a discussion with someone who you know is not reading what you've written. How does one know that they are not reading what you write you ask? When they attribute other people's arguments to you and complain that you're drawing a moral parable from a statement of fact.

None of my arguments have been "might makes right" in any essential aspect and that's certainly not how a moral defense of the anti-ip-law position would go were I to conduct one. I'm mounting a pragmatic and primarily economic argument as to why the current system is unsustainable - not a moral argument as I made explicitly clear when I said "don't confuse what IS with what OUGHT to be", "it's what we have to deal with, regardless of whether it's a reality we like or not, it's the way things are" and "Which is not to say that it is a moral good or that it should be their legal right, only that it's the reality we have to deal with." Not only that my argument has, as yet been largely confined to copyright rather than patent related issues (which isn't to say I think patents are any better than copyright).

To simplify the position I have been arguing into premises:

0. Everybody wants stuff, or wants money to buy other stuff.
1. IP is an infinite good. The marginal cost of infinite goods tends to zero.
2. Attempts to treat IP like regular property rely upon artifical scarcity.
3. The price which any product sells for is function of what the buyer is willing to pay balanced against the bargaining power that a seller is able to wield. Both of which are a function of supply and demand.
4. Increasing technological power (in the sense of both hardware and knowledge) in the hands of consumers makes the artificial scarcity easily circumventable.
4 1/2. Consumers react negatively when they percieve they are treated poorly.
4 3/4. Consumers view attempts at enforcing artificial scarcity via technological limitations or legal means as hostile acts.
5. The proliferation of consumers and technological anonymity options makes legal enforcement untenable (and 4 1/2. makes it rather undesirable).
6. Infringment channels operate as competition within an economic context.
7. Consumers will opt for the choice they feel represents the best value to them. (value in this context can be a number of things, including functionality, quality, producer reputation and so on)
8. Consumers are by and large opting against artificially scarce options (shiny discs), and we can expect this trend to continue.

C. Business models which rely on artifical limitations are unsustainable and this will become more marked as technology improves - a time when infringement outstrips .
C2. If people want to make money from IP they need to offer it as part of a model which is insulated against the properties of infinite goods and doesn't need to rely upon artificial scarcity.

Now, I have no idea what you mean when you say "It's a social rather than technological or economic issue" - I'm looking at the economics of the situation, and any economic situation involves technological and social aspects, and any economic issue has social repercussions. I have no idea where the 'it' you think it 'comes down to' is. But, if you want to talk childish, then utterly misrepresenting someone's argument and shreiking "Won't somebody think of the artists? How dare you!" is pretty high up there.

Of course, I fail to comprehend why you think that my not supporting a business model being enshrined and protected by law equates to my saying that I don't believe that someone has no right to attempt whichever business model they see fit. If you want to try and make money selling something which everyone else can get for free then more power to you (in fact, many business models do exactly this see private healthcare in nations with public healthcare, the multi billion dollar bottled water industry and Trent Reznor's recent experiments in music distribution demonstrate that these are perfectly workable options). What I don't believe is that anyone has the right to expect their preferred business model to be legislated into protected status - though they have every right to try and make it work.

Now, it might well be the case that my illustrious comrades in opposition to ip-laws make bad arguments and slander muscians for their inappropriate levels of affection for their craft - but newsflash, I made no such argument, in fact, I explicitly framed my argument in opposition to such a characterisation (and made a number of suggestions I beieve to be workable models that ensure the IP producers get paid). It's an utter non-issue and irrelevant to my arguments and my posts, and frankly, I don't give a shit that it makes you sad - it's disingenuous to bring it up in relation to and contradiction to my post.

As for your social critique of consumerism - it may indeed be the case that thwarting our consumer culture will change the economic realities, but that doesn't make a "consumerism is bad" response to "the business models cannot be sustained" a relevant one anymore than "Creationists need to die" is a response to the problems of the public school system and suggested reforms to the education system to limit their influence.

The question of what justification people may or may not use for copyright infringement is a non sequitur as nothing in my argument relates to justification or moral fortitude. Although, it also the case that my argument in no way relies upon the RIAA or its ilk being a harmful influence (they don't hurt it in that they drive away paying consumers but the argument stands without their existence) in fact, my argument relies upon the fact that infringement will occur regardless of whether or not the RIAA exists. So, your point about infringment continuing in their absence is rather missing the point.

What is utterly disingenuous is pretending that opposing copyright reliant business models EDIT being protected by law /EDIT is suggesting that content producers do not need to be paid, or do not deserve to be paid or that without those protections that they cannot be paid. Before copyright minstrels, musicians and authors and other sundry content producers made money. And today, content producers legitimately make money independently of the IP protections and in spite of them.

In addition, there's been a strong thread of delegitimzation of the work of those who don't work with technology, and even those who don't hew the party line. One need only look through this thread to see the attitude that people who don't work in the "right" industries aren't respected at all. So that has helped as well, as it makes it easier to say "oh, he's just a musician/actor/etc." and just discount any points made. Finally, as I pointed out, your final comment is just crab thinking - the only reason you feel that way is because you think that somehow the guy who makes such a work is somehow getting a better deal than you, and that's just not fair! It shows a paucity of the soul to me when people take that attitude, because it says to me that instead of seeking to be happy for others good fortune, you want them to be held to your level.

Man, fuck you, ass-hat. Not only has nothing I said been at all related to people being "just actors", or delegitimising certain industries, but the idea that my final comment was sour-grapes is some great work on the ad hominem front. Look, genius, the current argument for intellectual property protections is that intellectual labour is just as valuable as manual labour and that those who perform intellectual labbour deserve to be compensated appropriately - hence intellectual property is defined and is declared to be equivalent to real property. My final comment was that there was a clear disanalogy between the provisions for intellectual and physical properties - the different properties of scarce physical goods and infinite intellectual properties make sure of this. If the analogy breaks down, as it clearly does, then the impetus and justification for IP laws likewise breaks down. But if you want to talk about delegitimisation - advocating a system whereby intellectual labour deserves recurring compensation while physical labour does not delegitimises all non-intellectual pursuits as less valuable than physical labour.

Apothe0sis on June 2008

Tide goes in. Tide goes out.
Es-annon NEVA 4GET

0

Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular

Also, I forgot to add - you know how whenever there's a thread about drug legaisation or needle exchange programs one side puts forth arguments about how the net effect will be to curb deaths or that the current systems aren't working and then some crazy guy comes in and starts yelling at everyone "OMG DRUGS ARE BAD NOOOONONONONO!?!?! wHYYY OH GOD YOU'RE ALL FUCKERS"

Apothe0sis has identified many of the problems with IP rights. Although until his/her latest posts I had not realized his/her position was one against IP rights. The purpose of IP law is to promote innovation. In the current political/legal climate that purpose has been skewed. But I believe that it is a worthy concept that should not be abandoned.

IP is an infinite resource only in it's ability to be replicated and distributed. Innovation begets IP, and innovation is scarce. The effect of IP laws should be to make a business model based on innovation viable. Those skilled in innovating should be able to specialize in their skill. This provides for a larger overall economic growth.

The quote from Thomas Jefferson isn't untrue but it is besides the point. If an artist freely distributes his art you could say that he benefits from the exposure as much as the listener benefits from the art. But exposure does not put food on the table. It benefits the artist to be able to profit from the demand for his labor. And it profits the consumer when the artist can specialize in his art and create more product that he would otherwise. As demand increases more people are motivated to take the risk. This leads to more product to fill the demand.

The challenge is avoiding unintended consequences when creating laws. Part of the problem is the industry is more dynamic than the government. Part of the problem is developing a long term solution when the officials hold short terms at office.

ElectricityLikesMe: There are automated prior art searches. They can scan an application for key words and search the patent database for those. For the majority of applications is isn't effective. There are many ways of describing something in the English language. When I was working as an examiner, me and some of my colleges would cringe and curse when we received an application with HP as the assignee. Those lawyers have a talent for coming up with clever ways of claiming the same old shit. A lot of examining is interpretation. It would take a true AI to do that, and I am sure the private sector would have better AIs than the PTO.

I wonder if there is some way to automate the prior art checking process of patents. Surely there should be some innovation (lol) which would mean a system could identify things similar enough to count.

The open patent review is a step forward for software patents. What has happened is that if a company wants to patent something blatantly bullshit, they swamp the application in vague descriptions of kind of what it does so the overworked patent office employee is likely to be confused and think it's not really a simple common sense item.

IP in general, not bad. IP as used today in technology companies (either digital or pure engineering) tends to be mind numbingly stupid. That side of it needs some form of time-to-implement on the patent before it becomes fair game again. Both to stop Patent Trolls and to stop killing innovation via patent (patent something you don't want to ever become a product, sit on it and refuse to license it.)

I wonder if there is some way to automate the prior art checking process of patents. Surely there should be some innovation (lol) which would mean a system could identify things similar enough to count.

Nah, you already commonly hire a lawyer to file patents, they'd just be more clever about wording the process or device to get past the filters.

Software patents strike me as rather useless. The same algorithms can be used in a ton of different ways and often you end up with similar designs based on completely independent ground-up work. Things like compression algorithms are a bit less widely re-used, but I think the downsides of patenting those outweighs the benefits. Consider the mp3 format. It was invented and became the absolute standard, thanks to network effects. Since then, loads of formats have come out that have better compression, yet we are stuck with mp3, and are forced to pay for a sub-par algorithm. I also think it's rather unlikely that no one would have invented a way to compress audio if they couldn't get a patent.

That's the whole problem with copying formats. One arbitrary format is going to grow and lock itself into place, thus resulting in IP laws rewarding the creators of this format, who might not have even done the best job.

As for most other IP laws, they're a good idea. And they should be enforced internationally, and very aggressively. Piracy does actually threaten the US economy and IP laws should be upheld. However the current copyright laws in the US are insane. Retroactively extended 40 years, beyond a point which was too high to begin with, it's now the life of the author plus 70 years or 95 years for a corporate work. It doesn't foster creation, it just makes the people/corporations lucky enough to get a mega-hit even more wealthy. It makes my blood boil just thinking about how awful it is.

Novel file compression forms (as in, not just slightly more advanced X, but a new way to accomplish the same task), UIs, filesystems, overall kernel arch, these are all valid things to patent how you did them.

Patenting things to the point of small commonly used code structures is where it gets stupid. Or trying to make something a standard then claim ownership and patent it (haha ELF).

ext filesystems would be a patent, maybe (trying to remember plain ext's setup and faaaailing).

cat, however, would be a horrible patent (woo text parser?)

The question is how novel the concept or implementation is.

To go back to AH's techies ignore non techies, part of the issue is that IP didn't exist when music started. Not many people object to patenting a song. However, if way back in the day someone patented the G Chord, there would be the same hell to pay as the complaints about really simple code blocks being patented as if they weren't just common sense.

To go back to AH's techies ignore non techies, part of the issue is that IP didn't exist when music started. Not many people object to patenting a song. However, if way back in the day someone patented the G Chord, there would be the same hell to pay as the complaints about really simple code blocks being patented as if they weren't just common sense..

You don't and can't patent a song. Please don't use that word for all IP, it doesn't mean that.

He's not using it for all IP from what I can see, you can copyright songs all day long. He's talking about a chord, which would be more in the realm of patents than copyrights. It's a method or device, not an overall artistic work.

He's not using it for all IP from what I can see, you can copyright songs all day long. He's talking about a chord, which would be more in the realm of patents than copyrights. It's a method or device, not an overall artistic work.

Nah, I did misuse patent in front of song, since I'd been talking about patents.

I'd meant copyright, but anyways. The basic gist is that IT people are so pissy about patents because if they'd been around at the start of other "pieces form a structure" methods of creating all the pieces would be patented left and right, which is silly in the context of things today. You can't patent a chord, but you can patent a relatively small structure (say 5 lines) of code that make a function. Which is the programming equivalent of a chord.

Unfortunately, a lot software patents are unimplemented things like X with Y, where X is something novel like a book, and Y is something computer related, like the Interwebz. So you end up with a lot of patents like Books, on the Interwebz!

Novel file compression forms (as in, not just slightly more advanced X, but a new way to accomplish the same task), UIs, filesystems, overall kernel arch, these are all valid things to patent how you did them.

File systems and kernel architecture I could almost buy your point with - but UI's? Are you kidding me? UI patents are one of the keystones of bad software patents.

Even then, patents aren't for designs or architectures anyway. They're for processes. Unless you're patenting file system or kernel 'creation', then it's not a valid patent.

Apothe0sis, correct me if I misunderstand, but you favor encouraging IP producers to adopt business models that take advantage the infinite "supply" of IP rather than rely on artificial scarcity which I suppose IP laws create.

I believe your example was a musician releasing free music and thereby increasing the fanbase (and I'm assuming make more revenue through increased ticket sales and sales of other merchandise).

That works and is something musicians have been willing to try because the cost of actually recording a song is relatively low and there are alternative sources of income. Does your approach also hold where the cost of development and production is high and there are less alternative sources of income?